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Sunday, 17 July 2011

Just aint fair . . . for us women!

No contest, really.

Don't you sometimes wonder why, on top of the regular runnings that life throws our way on a daily basis, we women have some much more to contend with than our male counterparts:

No. 1: Periods!

This had to be listed as the number one most unfair affliction ever! How on earth did we get landed with the monthly leakage and our fellow men get off scott free. I don’t know about you but I get the most un-blessed pain with mine that I’m always knocked out for the first couple of days and some times, even the couple of days leading up to it.

Not to mention the ‘products’ we have to buy. Even if you’re feeling that end of the month pinch and can barely afford to eat, you’d better make sure you’ve got enough change for those essential ‘plugs’ (tampons, for those who are not following!); don’t even get me started about how much it costs these days for a pack of 16 … well, at least the pads no longer feel like you’re wearing half a mattress.

Yeah yeah, I know it’s a necessary evil; without the 4-weekly visitor we would never be blessed with children and families and evolution in general and blah blah but try see a man having to cope with such a thing – they’d try to bring an end to the reproductive cycle.

Which appropriately leads me onto the next point …

No.2: Childbirth!

Yep, another exclamation mark is necessary here!

I’m sure there’s not much need for me to expand; it takes two to tango and then … well the woman pretty much takes care of the rest from hereon in. From morning sickness to having urges to yam for two - things that aren’t even edible (chalk and coal are two things that come to mind), to walking around with all that extra weight that you can’t simply put down at a moment’s whim to the finale: the labour! Don’t worry BDSSers, I’m not about to get graphic here but you get my drift.

How is any of this in any way, shape or form FAIR?? They get to revel in all the pleasurable bits while we line ourselves up for the discomfort and pain – yea, that’s plenty fair.

Apart from the obvious, the only other blessing throughout this whole scenario is not having to contend with list No.1 :D

No.3: Hair

Ooh, don’t get me started. In fact just today, BDSSer Bi and I were discussing the gift of hindsight when it comes to hair. Fortunately, one of us (BDSSer Si) is leading the way to good, healthy, natural hair (click here to read more for yourself) but some of us are still in some sort of transition.

Whichever way you look at it, whether you wish to remain natural, decide to relax, opt for a texturiser, or go for locks – it’s all effort and serious dedication. You slacken, you risk losing your lovely tresses – but unfortunately, you sometimes don’t find this out until it’s too late to do anything about it.

No.4: Let’s Party!

“Yay, let’s go – on no wait, I need to get ready.” – The famous last words that I’m sure just about every man dreads to hear from their woman. Ok, I’ll dress this down for you:

Checklist - Male:

1.Shave

2.Shower

3.Moisturise

4.Choose garms

5.Smell fresh

6.Good to GO!

Checklist - Woman:

1.Select outfit

2.Paint nails

3.Wait for nails to dry

4.Locate your shower cap!

5.Apply face mask

6.Shower

a) Exfoliate

b) Shave

c) Foot scrub

7.Cleanse & tone

8.Moisturise face

9.Moisturise body

--- this is where that all essential gulp of wine is required ---

10.Change previously selected outfit

11.Find jewellery to match outfit

12.Find bag and shoes to match outfit

13.Find jacket to match outfit

And it probably goes on. Admittedly, everyone will probably leave out a couple of the above steps but generally, the woman's process of getting ready for a night out is considerably longer than that of a man’s – again, why is this fair??

And before the men jump down my throat with “well, you’re creating work for yourself”; if we didn’t, we wouldn’t have the confidence in ourselves to carry ourselves into the party and catch your attention – those of us who are taken still like to show off what we’ve got!

So BDSSers women; do you feel me?! What else is ‘unfair’ in the male vs female world? Despite my mini strop, I suspect it’s all worth the effort in the end. Suppose we’re designed to shoulder all sorts of loads so ‘I am every wo-man’ indeed! BDSSer men (you lucky so and so’s) do you appreciate the simpler life, or maybe you infact have it tougher than us? Please; enlighten me!

Yep, they're another couple of good ones MFMU! I've often thought about the need to strap ourselves in/down, not always the most comfortable thing to do either lol and nor is it achieving the positions to rival men in the world of work

But, it is great being a woman and experiencing the sweet sense of achievement when you succeed :)

So true Debs they do have it easy in so many ways! Men seem to have this power to zone out and focus on the most unimportant things whilst there is always some woman that is left picking up whatever they ignore that is important! I think this is a skill, because most women I know cannot ignore the same things without it getting to them eventually!

I could definitely do without the monthly bloatedness, breast tenderness, back ache and general palava of my time of the month.

As for the longness of getting ready to go out, I'd say after you've selected the outfit, the additional time is spent getting rid of hair, doing hair and applying make up, nail varnish etc, it add atleast 1 hour and a half extra time on. There is always someone left waiting, if it's not your partner, then its the cab man outside (the amount of times they've gotten into a huff having to wait for us BDSS ladies to get ready to leave out is quite some time.

The hair thing - to go off on a different tangent I'm convinced that this is why some men absolutely hate weave lol. Us women can decide to change up our hair style when ever we feel like it, and now this may or may not add extra time to getting ready to go out depending on what style chosen. But we still have a choice. Men tend to get to a certain age for example 25 and they will have experimented with all the styles and depending on how old you are the styles may range from relaxer (think Malcolm X and James brown) to hightop (think 90's kid and play) to Cornrow's (think Trey songz) to Jerry Curl (lol think Eddie Murphy, coming to america soul glow). After a certain age all that hair experimenting stops. although the facial hair experimenting remains (one minute there is a full beard, next minute its clean shaven, the next it's a goatee). Then eventually it goes grey or starts balding and thats when you have to shave it all off and go for the bald mature look.

While us ladies are growing it, cutting it, weaving it, straightening it, curling it, wigging it, we are having field day with it.

I think its hair envy ladies!

Okay enough commenting its coming up to 12am and my thought processes go off on random tagents at this hour. Although this hair envy thing is something I've been pondering for a while.